London: The personal details of 100 million users of social networking website Facebook are now available for download after they were leaked online, retorting to which the social networking giant says that the information was already public.

Ron Bowles, an online security consultant, used a code to scan Facebook profiles, collected data not hidden by users' privacy settings, and compiled a list, which is now available as a downloadable file, containing the URL of every "searchable" Facebook user's profile, their name and unique ID, the BBC reported Thursday. Bowles said he published the data to highlight privacy issues.

"People who use Facebook own their information and have the right to share only what they want, with whom they want, and when they want," the website said.

"In this case, information that people have agreed to make public was collected by a single researcher and already exists in Google, Bing, other search engines, as well as on Facebook."

"No private data is available or has been compromised," Facebook said.

The list has already been downloaded by over 1,000 people on Pirate Bay, the world's biggest file-sharing website.

One user, going by the name of "lusifer69", said the list was "awesome and a little terrifying".

But internet watchdog Privacy International said Facebook had been given ample warning that something like this would happen.

"Facebook should have anticipated this attack and put measures in place to prevent it," Simon Davies, an official of Privacy International, said.

"It is inconceivable that a firm with hundreds of engineers couldn't have imagined a trawl of this magnitude and there's an argument to be heard that Facebook have acted with negligence, he said.

Facebook hit 500 million users in June this year.

Filing tax returns made easy with e-filing

Bangalore: Filing tax returns is made easy with the option of filing it online. It is a much easier way to file the tax returns getting rid of the long and winding queues and tensions, reports Preeti Kulkarni from Economic Times.

There are few steps which would make it easy for the consumers to file their tax returns online. The first step is to log on to the website, incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in and register yourself with your PAN - which acts as the user ID - and log in to your account. After that, select the ITR form (2010-11) and download the same. For a salaried individual with no other source of income, the relevant one is ITR-1. As the next step, open the downloaded excel utility with 'macros enabled' facility. Validate all the information by clicking the 'Validate' key and proceed to generate an XML file. It will be automatically saved in your machine.

Upload this XML file on to the website by going to the drop down menu under the 'Submit Return' section; select AY 2010-2011 and the applicable Form. Select 'No' for the question 'Do you want to digitally sign the file?', unless you have obtained a class II digital signature. Doing all the steps correctly, a message about successful e-filing will be displayed on the site, along with a note that the ITR-Verification form has been mailed to your e-mail ID. Then you need to download the ITR-V form, print it out, sign the same and send it by ordinary post to Income Tax Department within 120 days of filing your returns on-line. A failure to adhere to the deadline will mean going through the process all over again. Consumers will have an easy and smarter way to file their tax returns with the e-filing option.

India's Global work force to hit 110 Million mark

Bangalore: India to witness the biggest increase in global work force over the next decade, by adding an additional 110 million workers by 2020. A recent estimate said that between now and 2030, India's labour force would mushroom by at least 210 million.

The rise in the labour force will come from more of the population reaching working age and a greater number of women in the jobs market. The country has a staggering 51 percent of its population of 1.1 billion people under the age of 25 and two-thirds under 35, according to government figures.

The rise in workers is equivalent to the current combined population of Britain and South Korea. The International Labour Organisation's projection for India contrasts with forecasts is that China's labour force will increase by just 15 million over the next decade while Japan's will fall by three million.

The changing demographics could add four percentage points of GDP growth to India's economy which is already expanding by more than eight percent, the Goldman Sachs report added. It said manufacturing could create the jobs needed to absorb the rise in the workforce, but the country will need a massive overhaul of its archaic labour laws and (make) a heavy investment in education and skills training.

Firms employing over 100 workers cannot make layoffs without government permission, which reduces incentives to invest in skill development, discourages economies of scale and inhibits competitiveness, the report said.

"Unless India reforms its labour laws, the industrial growth that is needed to absorb labour will remain in the realm of potential," warned Tushar Poddar, Chief India Economist at Goldman Sachs.

Experts say India's "youth bulge", seen lasting until 2050, could turn out to be its greatest asset -- or a demographic disaster if the country fails to provide education and jobs for its burgeoning workforce.

Google to develop Facebook competitor

Bangalore: In a bid to compete with social networking website Facebook,internet giant Google is in talks with several makers of popular online gaming companies to develop a broader social networking service, said a media report.

Attributing to people familiar with the matter, the 'Wall Street Journal' reported that Google has been in discussions with top developers like Playdom, Electronic Arts' Playfish and Zynga Game Network, a company in which Google recently took a financial stake, to offer their games on a new service it is building.

However, it is unclear when Google may launch the new gaming offering and the plans are not finalised, the report noted.

Google already owns and operates the social networking site 'Orkut'.

According to the publication, Google's push into social games represents the latest attempt by the web-search leader to capture users and advertising dollars that are increasingly flowing to social networking, an area dominated by Facebook, Twitter and others.

For social-game developers, a successful Google offering would mean they wouldn't be so heavily dependent on Facebook, where the vast majority of users access the games.

Oracle's Ellison tops best-paid CEO list for the decade

New York: Software major Oracle founder and Chief Executive Larry Ellison topped the list of best-paid executives in public companies during the past decade, receiving USD 1.84 billion as compensation, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis.

65-year-old Ellison, who founded Oracle in 1977, holds 23 percent stake in the company.

In the 10 years ended May 31, 2009, the most recent fiscal year for which Oracle has disclosed pay data, its market capitalisation nearly tripled to USD 98 billion, from USD 36 billion.

Barry Diller has bagged the second position in the list of 25 best-paid executives during the past decade. Diller received roughly USD 1.14 billion from IAC/InterActive and Expedia.com, the online travel site IAC spun off in 2005, where he remains chairman.

MakeMyTrip files $100 Million IPO in U.S

New Delhi: MakeMyTrip, the parent firm of India's largest online travel company, MakeMyTrip India, has filed with U.S. regulators for an IPO and plans to raise $100 million from the offering. The company intends to list its common stock on NASDAQ under the symbol "MMYT".

The company has filed a registration statement with U.S. market regulator Securities and Exchange Commission for a proposed initial public offering (IPO) of its ordinary shares, MakeMyTrip said in a statement.

The number of shares to be offered and the price range for the offering have not yet been determined. The ordinary shares are expected to be traded on the NASDAQ Global Market under the symbol 'MMYT', it added.
Morgan Stanley is the sole book running manager to the offering and Oppenheimer & Co Inc and Pacific Crest Securities LLC will act as co-managers.

MakeMyTrip is the parent company of MakeMyTrip India and MakeMyTrip.Com. Founded in April, 2000 by Deep Kalra (Founder & CEO), MakeMyTrip.com today has offices in 20 cities across India and 2 international offices in New York and San Francisco, in addition to several franchise locations. It was awarded the "Emerging India Award" by ICICI Bank & CNBC-TV18 and voted one of Asia's hottest technology startups by Red Herring in 2006.

The company's services and products include booking air tickets, customised holiday packages, hotels, rail and bus tickets, car hire and facilitating access to travel insurance.

Secret of Happiness - Own Small Bussiness

Toronto: The secret to happiness lies in being self-employed with a small business, says a survey of businesses in the U.S. and Canada.

According to the survey by Canada's TD (Toronto Dominion) Bank Financial Group, 69 percent of small business owners in the U.S. described themselves as "very happy" against 62 percent in Canada. The survey targeted 1,213 small businesses - with five to 50 employees - in a dozen cities across North America to examine the attitudes and behaviours of owners.

It revealed that nearly nine in 10 small business owners are happier owning and running their own business as compared to working for someone else.

"What the TD Small Business Happiness Index demonstrates is that small business owners enjoy a sense of control and freedom that they don't generally realize when working for someone else,'' said Alec Morley, Senior Vice President, Small Business Banking, TD Canada Trust. "Despite the recent economic downturn and the ongoing challenges of managing and growing a business, the personal satisfaction small business owners report illustrates one of the key advantages of owning your own company,'' he added.

Listing the several reasons for their high satisfaction levels, small business owners said that owning a small business gives them a sense of pride and accomplishment (97 percent) and a deep personal connection to their employees (91 percent) and their customers (84 percent). About 86 said that owning a small business gives them the opportunity to volunteer their time or make donations to charities, sports teams and events.

Listing the benefits of small business ownership, the respondents said the top three benefits are: being their own boss, setting their own schedule and being in control or being able to make their own decisions. "Small business owners tell us that owning a business has many advantages, despite the day-to-day challenges that come with running a company like red tape, property taxes and attracting and retaining talent," said Morley.

The findings also revealed that small business owners are happy no matter where they live. The top five happiest cities for small business owners in Canada are: Calgary (30 percent), Montreal (29 percent), Ottawa (27 percent), Toronto (26 percent) and Vancouver (23 percent).

But there are more "very happy" small business owners in Los Angeles (36 percent) and Boston (31 percent) than Canadian cities, according to the survey.

However, this happiness comes with a price as owning a small business means more working hours.

The majority of small business owners work 50 or more hours each week, compared to 40 hours for employees in North America, according to the survey.

Indians The Most Confident

New Delhi: Indians are the most optimistic about job prospects and personal finances globally and not only that, they are quite positive about the state of their personal finances in the next 12 months.

According to the Nielsen Global Consumer Confidence report, 92 percent of Indians were optimistic about their job prospects in the next 12 months. Nearly 14 percent of Indians think it is an 'excellent' time to buy the things that they want and need and 71 percent think it is a 'good' time to make purchases.

"The positive attitude of Indians comes on the back of a robust GDP growth (9 percent) in the April-June quarter of 2010. For the fiscal 2009-10, India's economy grew by 7.

Funds allotted for phase 2 of UID project

New Delhi: The Cabinet Committee meeting on the Unique Identification Authority sanctioned Rs. 3,023 crores for the second phase of its implementation. The meeting was presided by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

"The estimated cost includes project components for issue of 100 million unique identity numbers by March 2011 and recurring establishment costs for the entire project phase of five years ending March 2014," an official statement said Thursday.

Aadhar is the brand name for the 12 digit unique identity number.

The project was established last year to primarily ensure inclusive growth by providing a form of tamper-proof identity to people above 15 years of age so that the delivery of government programmes can be directed better, ensuring effective governance.

The project, after implementing the first phase by March 2011, intends to issue some 600 million more numbers over the next three years using the services of both the government departments and agencies, as also banks, insurance companies and oil marketing firms.

Under phase one, the plan is for setting up necessary infrastructure, creating testing facilities for pilots projects, setting up standards, establishing a project management unit for monitoring and hiring of consultants for project reports.

Among these, the authority has established its headquarters at New Delhi and set up six out of the eight proposed Regional Offices. It has also set up a technology centre and a test data centre in Bangalore.

India ranked 9th most attractive investment destination

New Delhi: India climbed four notches to be ranked the ninth most attractive investment destination in 2009 with a total foreign direct investment inflow of $34.61 billion, a UN report revealed.

India attracted sizeable overseas investment despite the overall drop in such inflows due to the global financial crisis, said the World Investment Report-2010, prepared by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad).

"If the situation continues to improve, India is likely to be among the most promising investor home countries in 2010-2012, as well as the third highest economy for foreign direct investment in 2010-2012," said the report.

"In 2008, though India attracted higher foreign direct investment worth 40.42 billion, its ranking was lower at 13th. China nudged further up to second at $95 billion from a third place last year," said Rashmi Banga, senior economist with Unctad.

The US remained the top investment destination with inflows of $130 billion in 2009, followed by China, France, Hong Kong, Britain, Russia, Germany, Saudi Arabia, India and Belgium. Total inflows amounted to $1.11 trillion, against 1.77 trillion in 2008.

In 2009, Indian firms and funds also invested a lower amount of $14.89 billion overseas, compared to a $18.4 billion in 2008.

"But such outflows are expected to rebound in 2010 sustained by merger and acquisition opportunities associated with Indian and Chinese firms' persistent pursuit of natural resources and markets," the report said.

The report also said that five Indian companies figured in the list of top 100 non-financial trans-national corporations, ranked by their foreign assets overseas.

Among them Tata Steel was ranked 15th, the state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corp in the 20th position, Hindalco in 29th rank, Tata Motors in 40th position and Suzlon in 54th.

Download Indian Rupee Font Symbol

Bangalore: The Indian Rupee Symbol has been finalized and typing the Indian Rupee symbol is not possible yet, because of its uniqueness and it not being part of the keyboard alphabets yet.

Nevertheless, it is possible to download Indian Rupee Symbol wallpapers for desktop. These wallpapers can be downloaded and used on PC, Mac and Linux based desktops. However, to type the Indian Rupee symbol on the PC, can now do it by using the Indian Rupee font.

First of all download the Indian Rupee Symbol and install it to your PC. There are enough guidelines provided to install in Linux and also for Windows and Mac. After the installation select the font and press the "" key on the keyboard to insert the rupee symbol into documents.

Right now, the Indian Rupee Symbol will only be viewable on PCs which have the Indian Rupee font installed. It is also possible to create images of the symbol to use on websites.

HP to Delay Android Tablet untill 2011

Bangalore: HP has apparently delayed its Android tablet, which it originally planned to release by the end of this year. HP isn't giving up on Android completely. From what we can gather, the project isn't dead, it's just being delayed until 2011. There's no indication what led to the decision, but the safest bet is that HP didn't want to spread itself thin by developing tablets for multiple platforms, reports The New York Times.

Following its Palm acquisition announcement, HP reportedly canceled its planned Windows 7 tablet months ago. The company went on to announce that it would release a WebOS tablet by October, so it likely wanted to focus on that release for this year.

With so many other manufacturers working on Android tablets - including Acer, Asus, LG, and Dell - HP may want to wait until it can offer something completely unique, and not just another slate that runs Android.

Scientists find key to Da Vinci's lively paintings

London: How did Leonardo Da Vinci manage to paint such perfect faces? For the first time, a quantitative chemical analysis done on seven paintings from the Louvre Museum of France, without disturbing any samples, explains why.

Da Vinci's paintings fascinate, partly due to a range of subtle optical effects that blur outlines, soften transitions and blend shadows, reports the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition.

Known as "sfumato", this technique is not only the result of the genius of the artist but also of technical innovations at the beginning of the 16th century.

Scientists used a technique called X-ray fluorescence, to determine the composition and thickness of each layer in the paintings (including Mona Lisa's) of Da Vinci, made through the 40 years of his career.

Scientists have also found different recipes used by Da Vinci to do the shadows on the faces, according to a Laboratoire du Centre de Recherche statement.

These recipes are characterised by a technique (the use of glaze layers or a very thin paint) and by the nature of the pigments or additives.

In the case of glazes, thin layers of one to two micrometres (a micrometre is a millionth of a metre) were applied to obtain a total thickness of no more than 30 to 40 micrometres.

The study was led by the team of Philippe Walter, Laboratoire du Centre de Recherche et de Restauration des Mus?es de France, in collaboration with the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility and the support of Louvre Museum.

Microsoft co-founder to donate fortune to charity

San Francisco: Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen has pledged to donate the majority of his $13.5 billion fortune to charity.

Allen's pledge came just weeks after his former business partner, Bill Gates, and legendary investor Warren Buffet both called on other billionaires to commit to giving away at least half their fortunes.

"I want to announce that my philanthropic efforts will continue after my lifetime," said Allen, who has already given about $1 billion to charity over the years.

"I've planned for many years now that the majority of my estate will be left to philanthropy to continue the work of the foundation and fund non-profit scientific research."

"As our philanthropy continues in the years ahead, we will look for new opportunities to make a difference in the lives of future generations," said Allen, 57, in the statement.

Allen is the 37th richest man in the world, with $13.5 billion in assets, according to Forbes magazine. He founded Microsoft together with Gates in 1975 and left the company in 1983.

Allen was diagnosed in November with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and began chemotherapy.

"Paul has finished his treatments and as of now has no current medical issues," said David Postman, a spokesman for Vulcan Inc, Allen's investment group.

'Epic' The new Indian browser

Bangalore: Indians have a new cause to celebrate with the launch of the first Indian made web browser aptly called 'Epic'. Released by a Bangalore-based software firm, Hidden Reflex, Epic is based on the Mozilla platform.

The unique feature that sets Epic apart from other browsers is that it has a built-in antivirus protection. The integrated antivirus and antispyware has been powered by ESET.

The web browser can be customized as per the user's desire. You can change the background and themes according to your preference. And there are over 1,500 free themes to choose from. The browser's has a number of apps in its sidebar like Twitter, Facebook, Orkut etc. You can directly launch them from the sidebar.

The Epic is highly Indian in its look and feel. The 'Indic' app in the browser lets you type in 12 Indian languages.

The browser makers claim maximum privacy by giving features such as one-click private data deletion, flash cookie deletion built-in and no storage of browsing history. Faster downloads and browsing are some of the other claims made by the Epic developers. So what are you waiting for? Go check and experience it for yourself. After all such innovations reinforce our feelings of being a proud Indian.

Google and Apple has shown interest in Palm

The bidding for Palm earlier this year apparently attracted interest from some prominent Silicon Valley companies, including some that were reportedly mostly interested in keeping the intellectual property out of the hands of their foes.

HP plans to use Palm's WebOS in tablet-style devices, but what of the Windows 7 slate that HP's Phil McKinney talked about earlier this year? HP won't say.

(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)

Hewlett-Packard ultimately turned in the winning bid, agreeing in April topay $1.2 billion for the PDA pioneer. However, before that was announced, five prominent Silicon Valley companies kicked the tires on the company, including Apple, Google, and Research in Motion, according to a Business Insider report that cites sources familiar with the negotiations.

Interest in Palm's vast library of intellectual property and patents attracted the interest of two fierce rivals: Google and Apple. Apple bid on Palm for the patent portfolio, even though it would mean that the company would have had to support two competing app platforms. Apple reportedly lost out because it didn't bid enough.

Subsequently, Google was interested in Palm because it thought Apple might want the intellectual property, Business Insider reported. However, Google reportedly did not pursue a bid because it believed Apple was not bidding.

Perhaps most intriguing is that BlackBerry-maker RIM had the deal for Palm in its hands and "had to work incredibly hard to blow it," a source told Business Insider. RIM was reportedly the frontrunner, but HP came back with a higher bid.

Representatives for Google and Apple did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Rumors began to fly that Palm was headed for sale after its most recent, dismal quarterly earnings report showed that the company had yet to gain any real momentum from its Palm Pre and Palm Pixi phones. Palm had hoped that the new hardware, along with its new WebOS mobile operating system, would help turn the company around.

Many saw HP's decision to acquire Palm as a quick way for the PC and enterprise services company to get into the burgeoning mobile device market. However, HP has been quick to point out Palm's appealing IP portfolio and has talked mostly about its plans for WebOS, which so far include a tablet and Web-connected printers.

R&D centers in India Helped MNC's to Save $40 Billion

Bangalore: The cost of running R&D centres in India has continued to decline over the last two years. R&D centres of MNCs in India have generated significant cost savings for their headquarters because of the lower operating costs over the years. According to a study 'R&D Operations Cost 2010 - The Need to Look Beyond Cost Control' launched by management consulting firm Zinnov Management Consulting. As per the study R&D centres in India have helped parent organizations save a cumulative of $40 billion for the last three years.

Currently, the cost of running R&D centres in India stands at Rs. 18.2 lakh ($38,199) per person per year. It reveals that the cost has declined by 0.9 percent in Rupee terms, 4 percent in US Dollar terms and 3.3 percent in Euro terms in FY 2010, indicating signs of continued cost optimization due to the constrained economic environment. The study has found that the decline was primarily driven by strict budgetary constraints of R&D centres of global companies in the form of minimal or no salary increments, focus on variable pay, freeze on hiring, and cost optimization across infrastructure, travel and communication.

The report shows that the future outlook also looks promising and with right strategies and long term view, companies will be able to continue to optimize costs. The study also forecasts an expected inflation in costs in FY 2011 with companies planning around 10 percent salary hike for FY 2011, hiring laterals, escalation in rents and opening up of travel. However, the report also reads that in a long term scenario the costs are expected to go up only by 6.7 percent CAGR through FY 2020 to reach INR 35 Lakhs per person per year.

Speaking about the findings, Pari Natarajan, Co-Founder and CEO, Zinnov Management Consulting, said, "Though India offers a significant cost arbitrage when compared with the costs in U.S. and Europe, the R&D centers in India are losing out on certain key aspects because of excessive focus on cost. While cost control is the top priority, aspects like innovation, competency creation and leadership roles often get over looked."

Bringing into perspective a comparative analysis of cities, the study said that Bangalore based companies incur higher cost as compared to the other cities. On an average, costs in Pune are around 3.5 percent lesser than Bangalore, with Tier 2 locations like Madurai, Coimbatore, Baroda, etc. almost 25 percent cheaper. In terms of size, smaller centers (0-400 employees) incur higher costs as compared to their mid-sized counterparts (400-1000 employees). However, the cost further increases for very large centers (1000+ employees).

India Ranked 2nd in Spam Generating Countries

Bangalore: Although considered to be the most cyber secure nation, India is ranked as the second most spam-producing country with a total of 7.7 percent of global spams. U.S. continues to be the number one spam polluter, piping out 15.2 percent of all global spam messages in the second quarter of 2010.

This was published in the latest report by the IT security and control firm Sophos on top twelve spam-generating countries. U.S. being number one in the list of top twelve spam-relaying countries, had an increase from 13.1 percent in the first quarter of 2010. With a total output of 4.6 percent of the world's spam, UK ranked in the fourth place which was at the ninth place in the first quarter of this year. Brazil is in the third position with 5.5 percent of all spams. The top five also includes South Korea which generates 4.2 percent of global spams.

Spam emails make up 97 percent of all emails received by business email servers. Used largely as a method for selling counterfeit or illicit goods, virtually all spam comes from malware infected computers (known as bots or zombies) that are controlled by 'bot herder' cybercriminals.

The report warns that spam is becoming increasingly malicious, not just advertising unwanted goods, but spreading links to malicious websites and computer infecting malware. Graham Cluley, Senior Technology Consultant at Sophos said "Businesses and computer users must take a more proactive approach to spam filtering and IT security in order to avoid adding to this global problem."

New Symbol For Indian Rupee

New Delhi: The Union Cabinet today approved the new symbol for the Indian rupee which includes both the Devnagiri 'Ra' and the Roman capital 'R' and has two parallel lines running at the top. The parallel lines symbolize the equal to sign.

Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Ambika Soni said the Rupee symbol was a nice blend of modernity and Indian culture. "The new symbol reflects and captures the Indian ethos and culture", the cabinet said in a statement.

The symbol selected has been designed by an Indian Institute of Technology postgraduate D. Udaya Kumar and was selected from among five short listed symbols. Kumar is with the Department of Design at IIT Guwahati. He explained that the design is based on the Indian Tricolour.

"My design is based on the Tricolour with two lines at the top and white space in between. I wanted the symbol for the Rupee to represent the Indian flag. It is a perfect blend of Indian and Roman letters: a capital 'R', and Devnagari 'Ra', which represent rupiya, to appeal to international and Indian audiences" said Kumar.

All new notes will now bear the symbol.